Duel
by Stand Alone Battle A.I
Summary: The crossover that nobody asked for... Garrus Vakarian versus Slenderman.


**Why? Well, why not?**

**So to you, I present a little something different from all of the flowers and heart shaped bull crap; A true survival horror. My Valentines gift you!**

**I own nothing, but god do i wish i did. Id actually have some money for once. :(**

* * *

To a being that had no eyes, it was hard to describe the world. Everything was nothing more than a series of oily shadows, sound, and the scent of fear.

The last one was easily the most prominent, as it was everywhere. It was all over the trees, the grass, it lit up the shadows, and made the entire forest teem with the promise of prey. The simplest of emotions was both a tool of the hunt, and it's reward, all rolled into one.

And it knew, that the turian was afraid, made its entire twisted existence entirely worth it.

Slenderman moved slowly, like the shadows of the forest floor, it was soundless. It's night long, war of attrition, was coming to an end as it could sense that it's prey was no longer moving. Garrus Vakarian had proven to be it's hardest hunt, it had ever known, in it's long existence. However, even the right hand turian, of Commander Shepard himself, was no match for the hunter of the shadows.

Honing in on the sound of labored breathing, he saw his blue armor as it glinted in the moonlight. Unable to stand, Garrus struggled for breath, and Slenderman saw that he was clutching one of the several pages that littered the forest. Warnings that had been laid out from victims of past, the unnatural creature wondered if he'd left any warning's of his own, for future hunts.

If he did, then the act was futile. It always ended the same. Nobody could ever win.

Finally at the end, Slenderman stood over the fallen warrior, and reached out to him with his slim hand of death...

xxxx Earlier that day xxxx

Jeff Moreau winced at his aching joints, and situated himself in front of the dashboard of the Normandy's cockpit. Finally able to call himself comfortable, Joker clapped his hands together and smiled jovially "Alright, EDI, gimme good news!" He said, and at his command, the dashboard lit up, and EDI's traditional blue sphere winked into existence. Admittedly, Joker would much rather speak to her physical platform that she used as a 'body', but it was currently down in engineering, assessing the damage from their crash.

"The ensuing detonation of the crucible has knocked out several of my primary systems, and has caused considerable damage to much of the ship."

"Ah. Good start, go on..."

"I have run several cross references to the surrounding solar systems, and I have no data on this planet. It is possible that my databanks are damaged, though more than likely, this planet is uncharted."

"Sweet! I hope its the latter one! That ups the chances that no one will ever find us."

"I have also noticed another anomaly. Sensors are picking up high traces of Element Zero from the direction of the relay that we dropped out of. The amount, and the pattern of the burst, indicate that the relay itself may have exploded."

"Wow, so were not only stranded on this planet, but we're also be stranded from the rest of the galaxy itself? Man, will the good times never end!?" Joker said gleefully, and a blue hand appeared on his shoulder. Liara poked her head into view, and she looked at the readouts on the primary HUD.

"Honestly Joker, you're not making the situation any better with all of these terrible jokes..." she said, and began to scroll through the system readouts. Almost everything was flashing the word 'ERROR'.

"I _am _trying to make situation better. For me." he added. Causing the asari to frown. "And how, pray tell, does this help in anyway?"

"Well, ill be honest. We're stranded in the middle of the woods, we're lost, and its about to be dark soon. I've seen enough holovids to know how this is going to end. The funny guy always gets it, second to last, so really i'm just trying to prolong the inevitable." Liara did her best not to facepalm.

"Joker, this is not some obscure fictional story, this is real life!"

"Well, I dunno Blue, you gotta admit its kind of a perfect setup for a horror vid." Liara and Joker turned to see James, Ashley and Garrus walking up to join them. "I mean, all we're really missing is a reason to go hiking in the middle of the night..." The latino said, and looked at both women expectantly. "Maybe a really hot shower scene wouldn't hurt either." They, in turn glared back at him. Well, Liara did, Ashley smacked him upside of his large head, and called him a pig. Garrus shook his head, and decided to use the small interruption to cut in.

"Yes, this is very amusing, but I was just outside with Tali, and she said that most of the outer hull is still pretty intact." He said, then looked over at the council. "buuut, maybe a we'll get lucky and help will come. Are we broadcasting a distress beacon?"

"As per emergency protocol, I deployed a distress probe into the planet's upper atmosphere before our crash, and even now, continue to broadcast an SOS. However, my scans show that there were no, nor have there ever been, any sign of any vessels through this area."

The turian officer sighed, and rubbed a gauntleted hand over his tired face. Admittedly, leaving the battlefield may not have been the best decision that they've ever made. Escaping from the Crucible when it was about explode... or whatever it did, seemed like an awesome (albeit slightly cowardly) choice at the time. Unfortunately, now that they were stuck in the middle of the woods, on a planet that nobody's ever heard of...

How did that human saying go, 'off of the stove top, and into the oven? Was that it? Meh. He was sure it was something like that. Garrus tuned back into the group, and found that Ashley and James in the middle of an argument.

"...that's bullshit Vega, and you know it! Everyone knows, that its always the jock that dies before any of the girls do. The only exception to this rule, is if any of them are drinking, doing any drugs, or are really slutty." Ashley's eyes darkened for a second, then she shot the shadow broker an off handed dirty look "...Actually, I take it back. I think I know who's going to eat it first."

"Yes, I believe its going to be the insufferable jerk!" Liara shot back.

"You man stealing hussy!"

"Hard to steal anything, when _you broke up with him!_"

"WE WERE ON A BREAK!"

"Bitch!"

"Whore!"

"Slut!"

The situation escalated quickly, as Liara viciously tackled Ashley to the ground. Garrus and James barely had time to get out of the way as the two women rolled by, trying to fight for dominance.

The rest of the Normandy crew all braced themselves, for the very real possibility of having to dodge a biotically thrown terminal, or a wayward grenade from Ashley's launcher that was still strapped to her back. However, everyone was stunned into silence as the two slapped, grunted, pulled hair, and tried to spit on each other.

"My god, this is actually happening..." James muttered, with a look of pure awe on his face. As if he was witnessing the rarest, and most epic catfight in all of history. Joker would have responded, but he was too busy accepting bets from other crew members.

The turian, on the other hand, was not so amused "You people all disgust me." He said, with a pointed scowl "I'm breaking this up, right now."

There was a long and audible *_riiiiiip* _as Ashley managed to tear away a section of the Shadow Broker's shirt, revealing a black and lacy bra underneath.

"...Maaaybe we should just let them settle their differences. I mean, this _is_ how we do things on turian ships..." Garrus said, and discretley passed Joker his credit chit.

_XxxXxxX_

Tali'Zorah vas Normandy lay under the belly of their fallen ship, and utilized the scant 3 feet of space to cut warped chunks of ablative plating off, with a small plasma cutter. Being that she had to dig out the spot that she was working in, her work space eerily resembled a coffin, or perhaps a shallow grave. Many would have found themselves claustrophobic, or severely uncomfortable with the fact that they had to lie in the dirt to get at the work area.

The quarian on the other hand... well she found the experience to be... cathartic. The galaxy was safe, nobody was asking her scary questions that came with being an admiral, and most importantly, she was working on a problem that she _could _solve.

The ship was broken, and she could fix it. And everything else was just a minor challenge to work around. Not in a proper drydock? No problem. She could dig holes, place dirt, or utilize latters to get at any section of hull she needed. No replacement plates to repair the holes? Easy. Ablative armor was great and all, but unless they were going into combat, it was entirely unnecessary. Really, almost any sturdy metal will work. Hell, if she was desperate, she could even heat up and reform, the storage containers in the cargo bay, to patch any hole she came across.

For her, going back to her basics somehow felt... right.

The heated flame from Tali's cutter dimmed down, and finally went out. Reaching around her small cubbyhole, she realized that she'd used her last power cell.

"Ken! I need another powercell from the supply case! Could you toss one down to me?" The quarian called out, and waited patiently for some sort of acknowledgment.

Nothing.

Tali wriggled her way out of her hole to get a better view, she looked up near the spot she was working from. "Ken? Gabby? Can you guys hear me?" She called out. The woods seemed to swallow her voice, but if they were near, then they should have heard her. Still met, with only silence, the huffed and pulled herself out.

The quarian stood, while brushing the dirt off of her environmental suit, she brought up her omni-tool and opened a channel to their own devices. "Tali'Zorah to Donnelly, please respond. Over."

"..."

"Gabby? Do you read me?... Ken?" She tried again.

Something wasn't right. Tali's hud showed a clean and strong connection. However, all she was picking up was an odd hissing noise. Like, something was causing interference with their radios.

Switching channels, she contacted the ship "EDI, can I get a radio check?" She asked.

"Your signal is loud and clear, Miss Zorah. I detect no anomalies." Odd, then it had to be their radios. Everything was working fine earlier, and though the woods were dense, there shouldn't be any problems. "Thank you EDI, that's all I needed."

Satisfied that most of the dirt was off, she began the short walk to the aft of the ship. Ken was supposed to assisting Tali with the external hull, but its possible that he wandered off to go pester Gabby, who was currently repairing the main thrusters. If that was the case, then Tali may very well smack him with the but end of her shotgun.

Sometime during the entire reaper invasion, Ken Donnelly finally found the courage to confess his feelings to his lifelong friend, and Tali had been absolutely giddy. Those two made such a cute couple, that it practically gave her goosebumps.

Unfortunately, once the novelty wore off, it turned into a huge pain in her ass.

As it turns out, Alliance warships had rules and regulations against fraternization, and she was very quickly finding out why.

The Normandy, or really any ship for that matter, was simply to cramped for any real privacy. On numerous occasions, Tali would walk up into a storage closet, maintenance shaft, or even just a dark corner of the ship, and catch those two going at it like the world was ending. (Which it was at the time)

Keela, and then there was the damned innuendo...

As it turned out, since engineers often used words, like _screw_, or ,_mount_, or anything for that matter, everything could be made into a dirty statement. Tali would say something like; 'Ken, could you go with Gabby, and push the control rod into the rear induction port? You should hear it, when it goes all the way in.' And then Ken would say, 'That's what Gabby said last night!' and then they'd giggle about it _for a god damned hour._

Kella help her, but there were times when she _honestly_ considered siccing her attack drone on them.

Finally reaching Gabby's work area, Tali was about to call out to them again when she froze, dead on the spot.

Tools, and parts, were everywhere.

The tools were one thing. Especially when the job was big, engineers had a habit of leaving things where they were needed, and not necessarily where they belonged. But the parts...

Shotgun now drawn, Tali picked up a complex looking piece, roughly the size of her hand. A plasma exchanger. These things needed to so clean, that they were practically sterilized when pulling them out of the package. If ANYTHING other than plasma was in this, when it was turned on, it would cause a tremendous fire. To find it just lying here in the dirt... Gabby, or Ken, would never make such a stupid mistake.

Queuing up her omni-tool, she contacted EDI "EDI, I need you to run a scan of the local area. I can't find Engineers Donnelly, or Daniels." She said. Her shields were already shimmering into existence.

_"I apologize Miss Zorra, but I am currently in the middle of a level 3 diagnostics check. All external sensors are currently down. Would you like me to abort the check?"_

X

_"Yes, EDI, something's not..."_

EDI, though a single mind, was capable of things that mortal men could only dream of. Armed with the raw processing power of a 'blue box' hard drive, she could actually make lesser versions of herself. VI's of the original AI, each one could be given tasks and complete them as if she were doing them herself. Even now, she was holding conversations with two crew members, Tali, controlling the EVA platform, and was trading banter Joker as he watched the catfight between Liara and Ashley.

However, all of it came to a screeching halt, when Tali's silence over the radio was broken with a shotgun blast.

Her reaction was instantaneous. Before Tali even had a chance to rack the slide of her weapon, a set of initiatives was already put into place. Unfortunately, her external sensors were down, due to a diagnostic. To halt the process, reset, and bring up her array, would take precisely 43 seconds. Too long, as Tali's shotgun was now going off in rapid succession.

_[BOOM CA-CHINK. BOOM CA-CHINK.]_

EDI's platform, however, could be outside in 11. Already, it was at a dead sprint, knocking anybody aside unfortunate enough to be in the way. Alarms blared across all decks, accompanied with her voice on the PAs.

"Emergency: Tali'Zorah is under attack. All combat capable personnel report outside immediately."

X

In spite of what was going on outside of the Normandy, it was oddly serene when the port door bursted open. A ladder had been set up, so that crew members could safely climb down the 6 meter drop to the ground. EDI had been the first to reach the door and, not having the same limitations as her organic friends, simply leapt off of the hull. She landed on the ground with all of the grace of a Terminator, making a loud 'thump!', and leaving an impressive dent on the ground.

Others soon followed, though painfully unprepared. James, Ashley, and Liara weren't even in armor. The former two were at least armed, Liara hadn't even been carrying her gun at the time. However, her biotics easily made up for this.

Aside from EDI, who didn't need armor, Garrus was the only one fully armed, and armored. Not that he'd expecting any trouble, the Turian simply lived, ate, and worked like he was ready to deploy at any minute. Hell, many of the crew members assumed he _bathed_ like he was ready to fight mercs on the way to get a towel.

Professionals that they were however, they moved with precision. Already, James was covering Ashley and Liara, as they climbed down. Garrus opted to stay on the hull, he took advantage of the high ground, and unfolded his sniper rifle.

"EDI, where's Tali at? What kind of hostiles are we dealing with?"

"Unknown. Tali was reporting suspicious activity, when I detected weapon's fire. The Normandy's sensor array will be online in 25 seconds." She said as she swept her sub-machine gun left, then right.

"Tali!" Ashley called out. She and Vega were already advancing around the ship.

"Yo, Sparks! Where you at!?"

Garrus brought up his omni-tool, and tried to contact the missing engineer. "Tali, this is Garrus. We're outside, what's your situation?"

"..." nothing but the odd hiss of static.

"Tali, this is Garrus, do you copy?" Garrus swore "when was Tali's last transmission?"

"Contact was lost over 20 seconds ago... please hold, my sensor array is coming back online." EDI said, and paused, as a flood of data came her way. Garrus scanned the trees nearby. _Damn it! _He thought. _They can't be far._

"Guys!" Liara called out "I think I found something."

X

Minutes later, they all stood at the site where they'd Tali, and her team were working. Most of the security team was outside now. British soldiers all vigilantly stood watch, and murmure as they heard as news of what happened. Gossip was spread like wildfire.

"I dunno guys..." James said, as he toed at some random tool on the ground "I mean, its messy and all, but it doesn't really look like a fire fight went on."

"I agree." Garrus said. Years of detective work was all coming into play. He knew the difference between organised chaos, that seemed to follow engineers, and actual chaos of a fight. "We have to assume that whatever got them, took them by surprise."

Ashley, followed closely by Liara, waked up carrying a handful of spent heatsinks. "Not entirely. Look what i found.." Though they were still hot, they were covered in a heat resistant casing, to prevent them from being a fire hazard every time somebody ejected one.

"It is odd." Liara said "Other than the heatsinks, we can detect no other signs of a struggle. No scuff marks in the dirt, no sign of returned fire... It is as if she has vanished..."

"EDI, anything on that scan?"

"Negative. All scans, Ladar, Thermal, and Biometric, detect nothing other than indigenous wildlife in the area."

"Is it possible that they're using some sort of stealth device? A jammer maybe?" The turian officer asked, staring out into the forest, he was trying to shake the feeling that they were being watched.

"That scenario is unlikely. The Normandy is equipped with some of the most advanced Counter ECM technology available."

Garrus looked out over the horizon. It had to be late afternoon, for whatever this planet's cycle was. It was gradual, but the sky was slowly going from blue, to a rich orange-red. they had hours, but it would be dark soon. For what had to be the dozenth time, did he regret leaving the Sol system, and wished Shepard was here. He always knew what to do.

"Officer Vakarian?" Garrus turned his head back to EDI, and marveled at her face. She'd come a long way, in her journey to try and be more human. Her face showed uncertainty, and more importantly; concern.

"Yes, EDI?"

"Time of disappearance, for Ken, Gabby and Tali, is now approaching 15 minutes... Every Minute we delay, decreases our chances of safely recovering them. May I propose we form a search party?"

It was an illogical decision. They were facing an unknown enemy, or enemies, with no idea of their capabilities. Tali had been armed with her shotgun, and they got her.

And that is no joke.

Between Saren, the Collectors and the whole damned Reaper war, Tali has had more combat experience than most turian squadrons ever got, _combined_. She was hand-selected by Shepard himself. Whatever they were facing, if it could get Tali, then _none_ of them were safe.

But seeing EDI, he knew that she didn't care. She deemed them all as friends. And like the rest of Shepard's squad, they'd risk anything, if meant helping each other.

"That sounds like a plan, EDI." Garrus said, and addressed the whole group. "Alright! Liara, Ashley, and James, go back inside, and gear up! Heavy combat load, lets meet back here in 5! All security team members, get back inside and seal the ship. Nothing in, or out, am I understood?" Though technically Garrus was not in a position of leadership, everyone snapped a salute, or acknowledged his orders. Really, they were just happy to have somebody take charge.

XxX

They'd split into teams if two. Though fanning out individually, increased their chances of finding their missing engineers, there was no way anybody wanted to be caught alone, if attacked.

Garrus and Liara moved cautiously through the woods, while EDI, Williams, and James were about half a click away. They made team 2. Since they still weren't sure if anytype of jammer was involved, they maintained radio chatter, so they'd know the moment anybody lost contact. As a bonus, it also helped to keep moral up.

_"So, uh, Blue, you're like, the shadow broker now, right?"_

_"I have a name, and yes, I am the Shadow Broker."_

_"Right, sorry Liara... but I have to ask, does this mean you know, like, secret stuff? Like, who killed Kennedy, and all that junk?" _Liara smiled at the question, she wasn't familiar with earth history to know who this Kennedy was, but it was easy to assume that it was some sort of human conspiracy theory. Like human, every race had them. "I am willing to admit, I have a lot of answers to a lot of unanswered questions... but..."

_"But what?"_

"They may be a little hard to find, under all of the sex tapes."

Garrus stopped dead in his tracks, and though he wasn't there, he could almost _feel _team 2 doing the same thing.

"You're joking, right?"

_"For real?"_

_"You serious?"_

_"I too, find that my interest is also piqued."_

Liara had to chuckle at their disbelief. "Oh yes. Oddly enough, it is the number one piece of traded information, that goes through the archives."

"Makes sense" Garrus deduced. "Everyone does it, its probably easy to get, and makes for nice blackmail material."

_"Wait, wait, wait" _Ashley said _"so... does that mean you have ones on us too?"_

There was a pause "...No?" she did.

_"Why did you take so long to answer for?" _James asked suspiciously. _"_Do _you actually have sex tapes on us?"_

The shadow broker began to sweat. "Uhhh... well... not, all of you anyway..."

"What do you mean, not all of us?" Garrus asked. "Exactly how many-"

_"Foreign object detected." _EDI interrupted. Liara almost broke down, and thanked the goddess right there and then.

"W-what did you find, EDI?" She asked, loudly, and pointedly ignored the look she was getting from her turian companion.

Where the Issue of finding Tali, or the other missing engineers, not so important, they would have pressed the topic. Seeing, that this was not the time, he put the issue on a backburner, and Garrus keyed his own mic. "What-

X

-_kind of foreign object?" _Garrus asked.

"It appears to be a single sheet of paper, 50 meters north of our position" EDI said. James and Ashley activated the zoom on their own helmets to get a better look. "Yeah, I see it." James said "Looks like somebody stuck it to the side of a tree."

Ashley scanned the nearby area, using the scope of her rifle, "I don't see anything else... maybe its a warning?"

_"Hmmm... I guess this answers the question of whether or not we're alone on this planet."_

"Ash, EDI, I'm gonna advance foreword. Cover me?" The large latino asked, and received nods from both women.

_"Be careful, Vega, something's not right." _

Were James any less disciplined, he would have rolled his eyes. What was it about these situations, that made everyone point out the obvious? It wasn't like he was planning to bludgeon in, like some damned rampaging Krogan. Regardless, he gave a 'roger', and moved in.

The process was agonizingly slow, but entirely necessary. Trusting that Ashley and EDI, were watching his back, all of his focus went into watching every single step. Setting off a landmine, or any proximity sensor for that matter, wouldn't do anybody any favors.

However, in spite of all of his caution, it proved to be entirely unneeded. There was nothing. Not a single trap, or any danger for that matter. Just a silent forest.

Waving the girls foreword, he indicated that the coast was clear, and pulled the note off of the tree.

James Vega had barely given the paper a once over, by the time the others had caught up. However, it was all that was needed.

DON'T LOOK... OR IT TAKES YOU.

"... wow, this is the creepiest thing I have ever seen in my life." Vega declared. And handed it to Ashley, as she finally caught up it to him.

"What the hell is this?" she asked. Her hand idly traced the crudely drawn stick figure on the bottom, right hand side, of the page.

"Did sparks leave this?" James asked, as EDI was doing her own examination. "It is unlikely. All forms of media, written or otherwise, is all digital. The Normandy has no paper. Nor, does Tali have any graphite pencils. " She said.

"_Guys... Liara and I found something out here... It's not good."_

Vega gave a snort, more in disbelief than anything else, and responded. "Let me guess, you found a creepy ass note, with an even creepier ass drawing?"

"_On the nose, as you humans say. Our's says 'Always watches. No eyes'. You have the same?"_

"No, ours is even better... You think this has something to do, with what happened to Ken, Gabby and Tali? I mean we..." Vega stopped and perked his head up. He listened, and he noticed that he could... hear something...

He looked over at Ashley, and saw that she too, was able to hear it.

"_Do you guys hear that on your end?" _ Liara asked, and everyone noted that her radio sounded... off... Like there was an odd hiss, over the airwaves.

More than anything, they could _feel_ it. A sense of doom. Almost as if, they've made a serious mistake, of being outside now that it was getting dark.

"Yea," he looked to Ashley, who nodded in agreement "Yea, we hear it Blue."

"_EDI, what's your take?" _ Garrus asked.

"It appears to be and anomalous low-band frequency. I also detect that it is causing minor interference with our electronic equipment."

"You gonna be okay, EDI?" Ashley asked. Something that messed with Electronics had to be bad for someone who _is _an electronic piece of equipment.

"Yes, my platform is heavily shielded to protect me from this very scenario. However, this also makes me wonder if this is somehow related to what happened to Tali."

"_More than likely, yes... I think we need to get back to the ship." _Garrus said

x

Liara T'soni stared at the turian, with a look of utter shock. "Go back to the ship? Garrus, we can't do that. We haven't even found Tali yet!"

"You think I don't know that?" he shot back. "Look at the situation we're in! We've been searching for hours, the sun's about to set and all of a sudden, we're finding _these_!" he said, and shook their note in front her face.

"Liara, I think we've been lured out here, and that something very bad is going to happen as soon as it gets dark enough."

"What are you saying, we're being hunted?"

"... I believe so." He said, and reopened the channel to the rest of the squad. "I'm setting a rally point. Let's meet up, and head back to the ship. Keep on your guard for anything out of the ordinary."

Garrus turned, and looked at the star that was setting over the horizon. For all of the war, death, and destruction he'd seen, he felt something he hadn't felt since he first discovered the Reaper's true plans for the entire galaxy.

He felt dread.

The light, and all of the safety it promised, dimmed to a sliver. And within minutes, it was gone.

Garrus knew, that the night had begun.

* * *

**What did you guys think? This is my first attempt at something that isn't a strait comedy, so i'd really like a little feedback.**

**Next Chapter is coming soon (for real soon) and I'm going to see how i do with something a little more action orientated.**


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